Performing Democracy: US-USSR Exchange Debates and the Ethical Technologies of Cold War Diplomacy

Authors

Brian Lain, University of North TexasFollow

Abstract

This essay examines the US-USSR exchange debates of the 1970s, organized by the Committee on International Discussion and Debate (CIDD), as a cultural technology integral to Cold War liberalism. Moving beyond traditional narratives of détente-era cultural diplomacy, it argues that these exchanges served not merely as tools of soft power but as ethical performances that modeled free speech as a central democratic conviction. Drawing on the frameworks of Greene & Hicks (2005), Hicks & Greene (2010, 2022), and a Foucauldian conception of diplomacy, the essay analyzes how debate functioned as a practice of liberal democratic subject formation, shaping both participants and audiences through the enactment of deliberative norms. By humanizing Cold War adversaries, performing discursive struggles, and fostering long-term shifts among future policymakers, the CIDD exchanges illustrated the complex interplay between discourse, ethics, and power during the Cold War. The essay thus reinterprets these debates as pivotal moments in the subtle shaping of democratic practices and transnational identities.

Recommended Citation

Lain, Brian (2026) "Performing Democracy: US-USSR Exchange Debates and the Ethical Technologies of Cold War Diplomacy," Studies in Debate and Oratory: Vol. 3: Iss. 1, Article 2.
Available at: https://scholar.stjohns.edu/sido/vol3/iss1/2